606 General Notes. [June, 
been frequently consulted through the year by students in this 
department of study. The special work on this collection has 
been the arrangement ' of the Algz, of which there were a large 
number of specimens. 
BotanicaL News.—For some time occasional papers have ap- 
peared in the Amer. Mo. Micr. Jour., attempting to throw doubts 
upon the prevailing views as to the mode of fertilization in flowering 
plants. Microscopical preparations by Mr. J. Kruttschnitt, have 
been sent out for examination, with the intention of proving the 
new view. The editor of the Botanical Gazette in the January num- 
ber devotes about a page to an indignant denunciation of the 
whole matter. In the January Jour. N. Y. Micr. Society, Dr. N 
Britton devotes ten pages to criticisms of Mr. Kruttschnitt’s s 
papers and preparations. He closes by saying, “ The fact of fail- 
ure on the part of one, or indeed, of several persons, to discover 
a pollen tube in contact with the embryo-sac of an ovule, can, it 
seems to me, have no weight when viewed in connection with the 
fact that so many able investigators have often and undeniably 
seen such contact.” The friends of this wild theory need 
no longer complain of its being ignored by botanists! 
AH. Curtiss, of Jacksonville, Florida, has prepared two series of 
wood specimens, including seventy-five species in each. Each 
specimen shows heartwood, sapwood and bark, and is accompa- 
nied by a printed label. The low price at which they are sold 
($15 per single single series, or $25 for the two) ought to place 
them in many a botanical cabinet. An important pamphlet On 
the establishment of a Botanical Garden and Arboretum in Mon- 
treal, has been issued recently by the Montreal Horticultural So- 
ciety. It gives some valuable statistics as to the botanic gardens 
of the world, and sets forth their scientific and practical value. It 
is mainly from the pen of Professor Penhallow. One of the 
aye valuable catalogues issued by the exhibitors at the New Or- 
ans Exposition is that enumerating the articles forwarded from 
the Island of Jamaica, the work of Mr. D. Morris. It is particu- 
larly interesting as containing classified lists of plants and plant 
products. The collection of Florida woods in the gs, a 
is one of the finest on exhibition. It was prepared, 
assured, by A. H. Curtiss, of Jacksonville. The eoleo of 
California plants shown by J. G. Lemmon in the exposition, age 
tains nearly a full set of the ferns of the Pacific coast. of 
the absurdities to be seen in the exposition is a large well painted 
‘sign over a section of a big tree (Seguoia gigantea) which 
oy informs the seeker after wonderful things that these trees 
attain the age of 3700 years! Strasburger’s Kleine Botanische 
Practicum has just been received. It is to our mind a much more 
- < useful and usable book than the large one. It should be trans- 
sce et and es at once in this country for the benefit 
The thirty-fifth and thirty-sixth reports 
